Saturday, April 20, 2013

How to Make an Owl Cake

Sorry I haven't posted this tutorial sooner; we've had a busy week! We had four college students come and stay at our house for a week while they were in between semesters. Talk about fun! They made me feel young again, though 31 really isn't that old.

I think it may be the five kids that make me feel old.

Oh well, I still wouldn't trade my kids for anything. I wouldn't be showing you how to make this fun cake if it weren't for them anyway. : )

Here's what you'll need:

1 or 2 cake mixes, any flavor you'd like (I made two cake mixes because I wanted to try lots of different sizes)

Chocolate frosting

White frosting

Any color food gel or food coloring (I went with blue for my little boy)

Large chocolate chips (I used Ghirardelli Bittersweet Chocolate)

Candy Corn (I used a caramel flavored candy corn that had only two colors)

Hershey's Kisses

Using my large oven-safe Pampered Chef Batter Bowl, I poured an entire chocolate cake mix into it, after it was sprayed with baking spray, placed it onto a baking sheet, and baked it 25 degrees less than the box instructs for right around an hour. I used a wooden skewer to test if it was done.

The other cake mix, I divided between lots of other oven-safe Pampered Chef bowls. Do not bake the larger bowls with the smaller bowls since the baking time will be much different. These smaller bowls can be baked at the temperature listed on the box. Keep an eye on them, however, as baking times will vary.

Once the cakes have baked and cooled, place them on your desired serving tray or cake stand. Frost completely with chocolate frosting.

Using a large circle tip in a pastry bag, squeeze dots (that look like Hershey's Kisses) around the base of your cake, leaving space for the front "feathers" and eyes.

With a small offset spatula, press the spatula into the dot and pull straight up. Continue until the first row is done.

Repeat for subsequent rows.

Keep going all the way to the top.

Here's a picture of the space I left for the front "feathers" and eyes.

When the chocolate frosting is done, repeat the same process with your colored frosting, leaving a space for the eyes.

Pipe white frosting in large circles for the eyes. Add the large chocolate chips and the candy corn for the beak.

Finish with the Hershey's Kisses for the ears.

I continued on and made more...

...many more. Isn't that the cutest little owl family?!

We used one of the small owl cakes as my son's smash cake. Perfect size!